Has the milk-ordering-refrigerator
symbolism of the Internet of Things distracted other businesses from seeing its
true significance? As an example, consider the banking industry, which hasn't
paid much attention to the IoT so far. A leading analyst's prediction that
about half of all sensors installed by 2020 could be relevant to financial
services, should make them sit up and take notice.
In the past year the banking industry has been buzzing with
the benefits that blockchain technology offers and progressive banks took a
step further to implement blockchain pilots to test out these benefits. 2017 is
going to be the year when blockchain will move out of its pilot phase, and into
production. This is going to be the year when blockchain will be mainstream,
and the giants of the financial services industry have already indicated that blockchain is here to stay.
Blockchain has been a topic of discussion ever since its
inception in 2009 as the underlying technology for Bitcoin. The industry has
seen intense debate and deliberation on the potential of blockchain, with many
claiming, that it is as foundational, as the internet. Some banks state that
they have moved past deliberation stage on blockchain, and are starting proof
of concepts around this technology.
One of the biggest challenges that banks face today in their
digital transformation is the absence of right people, culture, and
organizational structure. Hence, to complete a truly digital transformation one
of the key priorities for banks in 2017 will be finding the right set of
people, and empowering them to carry forward with the transformation strategy.
Businesses across various and
diverse industries have seen rapid disruption in the past few years. One of the
major drivers for this disruption is the consumer and how they are coming to
expect a Frictionless approach. Some have called it the Uber effect. No cash is
needed, it is on demand and simple to use. That experience is what customers
are now expecting when interacting in the Ecommerce world. Many traditional corporates are playing
catch-up and some like Sears, JC Penny's, American Eagle, Sports Authority and
Barnes & Noble cannot pivot fast enough, leaving them in a position of
reporting negative growth or closing all together. Players like Amazon are disrupting
their business models by leveraging the latest in technology and rolling out
customer centric digital offerings. These offerings appealed to the digitally
savvy customers and those companies have grown rapidly over the past few years.
Blockchain technology underlying the 'Bitcoin' crypto
currency has created lot of buzz in the technology landscape compared to any
other technology in the past. Perhaps, blockchain is considered to be the
biggest disruption post 'internet'.
